Selective call communication devices such as pagers using present day technology have the capability of receiving information (e.g., advertisements, news, sports information, and other types of information) besides the traditional personal messages received by pagers. One type of such non-personal message information, described herein simply as additional information, could be of benefit to advertisers who advertise using broadcast systems, such as commercial television systems. Advertisers would typically benefit if additional information could be gotten to persons who view presentations of advertisements on television receivers or receive advertisements on broadcast radio receivers, if the additional information could be provided immediately, inexpensively to the user and advertiser, and without significant effort on the part of the user.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,752,186, issued to Malackowski et al. on May 12, 1998, entitled "ACCESS FREE WIRELESS TELEPHONY FULFILLMENT SERVICE SYSTEM" describes methods in which a mobile telephone caller receives additional information relevant to a radio broadcast or other advertisement. In a first method, the caller perceives an access code, for example, on a billboard or in a radio broadcast. The caller then initiates a telephone call using an access telephone number (perhaps also transmitted in the broadcast or listed on the billboard), an by using the access code, obtains additional information relevant to the billboard or broadcast. In a second method, the caller's mobile telephone receives the access code from a roadside transmitter or radio broadcast, and automatically initiates a telephone call to receive the information. It will be appreciated that, in the first method, the caller must remember or note down numbers and use them to obtain the information, making it complicated for the caller. In the second method, all such access codes are automatically used to initiate a telephone call, making it expensive for the caller or the service supplier or the advertiser, or a combination of the three. In both instances, it will be appreciated that a telephone call is initiated by each caller obtaining the information, and that each response is uniquely conveyed to the caller, again making it expensive for the caller or the service supplier or the advertiser, or a combination of the three. Such an approach can provide additional information to the caller but does not typically achieve all of the objectives listed above.
What is needed, then, is a technique that provides additional information to a person who perceives a broadcast presentation of interest, and that achieves more of the objectives of being immediate, inexpensive, and simple for the user.
A discussion of the FLEX communication protocol for example can be found in U.S. Pat. No. 5,555,183 entitled "Method and Apparatus for Synchronous Selective Call Signal", which is hereby incorporated by reference.